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In this study, flagellin, a highly conserved microbe-associated molecular pattern that increases after meals, is shown to activate TLR5 receptors expressed by neurpod cells in the colonic epithelium that signal to the brain via PYY release and vagal activation and influence feeding behaviour.
In this Tools of the Trade article, Mengting Han discusses the development of CRISPR-TO, a programmable method for perturbing endogenous RNA localization, and its use for functional screening of the spatial transcriptome in neurons.
Neuroscience has inspired artificial intelligence (AI) for decades but, in recent years, AI tools have begun to revolutionize neuroscience research. The emerging field of NeuroAI has the potential to transform large-scale neural modelling and data-driven neuroscience discovery. The field must balance exploiting AI’s power while maintaining interpretability and biological insight.
Growing evidence suggests that reduced cerebral blood flow contributes to cognitive decline in ageing and dementia. Attwell and colleagues discuss the underlying mechanisms and functional consequences of vascular dysfunction in ageing, Alzheimer disease and vascular dementia, and consider the implications for therapeutic interventions.
Prior learning, rather than decision-making-related processes, primarily shapes the subjective experience-based weighting humans assign to potential losses and gains during choices involving monetary risk-taking.
The use of transcriptomic technologies has led to advances in our understanding of thalamocortical targeting during development. In this Review, Guillamón-Vivancos et al. discuss these advances in the context of how transcriptomic changes and neuronal activity work in concert to drive sensory modality specificity during the development of thalamic sensory nuclei.
In this Journal Club, Mariam Aly discusses a 2000 study that attempted to settle the debate about whether implicit memories are lost or retained in amnesia.
Adverse experiences in early life affect brain development across species. In this Review, Nelson, Sullivan and Valdes discuss neuroimaging evidence for how these adversity-induced changes to human brain architecture alter developmental trajectories that may underpin adult psychopathology.
As scientists, we want solid answers, but we also want to answer questions that matter. Yet, the brain’s complexity forces trade-offs between these desiderata, bringing about two distinct research approaches in neuroscience that we describe as ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’. Recognizing the validity of both approaches dispels misunderstandings and unnecessary tension and promotes constructive interactions.
Population activity of hippocampal place cells in mice flexibly encodes reward-relative representations of experience, which can amplify behaviorally relevant sequences of events in memory.
Brain cell atlases are revolutionizing neuroscience by using single-cell and spatial genomics to reveal the brain’s cellular diversity across development, function and disease. Fully realizing the potential of these atlases requires continued technology improvement, multimodal data integration and strategies to address ethical challenges, paving the way for transformative discoveries in neuroscience and clinical applications.
The autonomic nervous system has long been viewed as a simple motor system in brain-to-body signalling. In this review, Wang and colleagues highlight diversity within autonomic neurons and their dynamic roles across physiological systems and disease contexts.
In humans, repulsion effects occur in specific subfields of the hippocampus and are associated with the presence of distinct internal beliefs about highly similar visual inputs.
In a mouse model of multiple sclerosis, trafficking into the brain parenchyma of the peripheral myeloid cells that are involved in the symptomaptology is shown to occur predominantly via the velum interpositum, a leptomeningeal tract that runs underneath the hippocampal formation.
The balance between neural excitation (E) and inhibition (I) shapes cognition, development and brain-based disorders. Electroencephalography and magnetic resonance spectroscopy allow non-invasive quantification of the E/I ratio but yield discrepancies that challenge their use in this context. Addressing these differences is essential for advancing biomarkers and brain-based therapies.
Optical microscopy allows neural cells to be studied in the intact brain, but imaging deep neural tissue presents substantial challenges. Prevedel and colleagues outline the principles of three-photon microscopy, highlighting its advantages for deep tissue imaging and its applications in neuroscience.
Recent years have seen a growth in our understanding of the biological drivers of eating disorders and their interactions with environmental and psychosocial factors. Foldi and Griffiths consider how interdisciplinary research, dimensional diagnostic approaches and improved animal models may enable the development of more effective treatments for these disorders.
The cerebellum helps ensure the speed and accuracy of movements, but its precise contributions to movement control are unclear. Nguyen and Person here evaluate evidence for and against feedforward motor control by the cerebellum in light of its well-defined role in a model of associative learning, and reconcile this with theories of internal model-based control.
